Posted on December 12th, 2012

It’s very much in vogue right now to espouse the benefits of “saying no” And, of course, I believe that you shouldn’t do things that make you unhappy or work with people who don’t add to or feed the work. But I also believe there is great value in sometimes doing the thing you don’t want to do, doing someone a favor, even doing something out of obligation. Because sometimes that thing we think we’re going to hate turns into the thing we actually love and every once in a while the person we wrote off, ends up being exactly the person we need.

While I believe that saying no is saying yes to other things, I believe that there are few greater deeds than saying yes to something or someone that will truly benefit from your time and attention. In fact, saying no to lesser things should be the default in order to make way for yes to these.